Aspects of the present disclosure relate generally to wireless communication systems, and more particularly, to techniques for improved operations of a high speed data and acknowledgement message transmission from a mobile device to a network.
Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, and so on. Such networks, which are usually multiple access networks, support communications for multiple users by sharing the available network resources. One example of such a network is the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). The UTRAN is the radio access network (RAN) defined as a part of the UMTS, a third generation (3G) mobile phone technology supported by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). The UMTS, which is the successor to Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) technologies, currently supports various air interface standards, such as Wideband-Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA), Time Division-Code Division Multiple Access (TD-CDMA), and Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA). The UMTS also supports enhanced 3G data communications protocols, such as High Speed Packet Access (HSPA), which provides higher data transfer speeds and capacity to associated UMTS networks.
As the demand for mobile broadband access continues to increase, research and development continue to advance the UMTS technologies not only to meet the growing demand for mobile broadband access, but to advance and enhance the user experience with mobile communications. Generally, during a high speed data transfer from a network to a user equipment, when a resource is allocated for downlink data from the network to the user equipment and the downlink data is transferred from the network to the user equipment, an acknowledgement message is sent by the user equipment. However, if there is a measurement gap for the user equipment and transmission of the acknowledgement message falls during the measurement gap, then the acknowledgement message cannot be sent by the user equipment to the network. In such a case, the user equipment waits for another resource allocation from the network (e.g., a retransmission grant for the previous downlink data) and receives from the network the previously transmitted downlink data after the measurement gap is over. That is, since there was no acknowledgement message from the user equipment corresponding the downlink data transmitted before the measurement gap, the network sends a retransmission grant for the downlink data and sends the previously sent downlink data to the user equipment. This creates unnecessary data transfers and delays in transmitting new downlink data from the network to the user equipment. As a result, there is a need for further improved techniques for downlink data transfers when a measurement gap is configured for the user equipment.